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Kickstarter launched to recycle buildings using living organisms

A Kickstarter campaign launched by US firm Redhouse Studio plans to create new building materials from the demolition waste of old ones.

The Ohio-based company is building a working prototype of a mobile recycler unit that can be brought to destination to collect waste building materials on site.

The campaign publicity says, "Living organisms, such as microbes and fungi, will be used as the binders of ground up materials instead of glues, so the process is eco-friendly."

The materials made will go through a variety of tests to show that they are equal or superior to commercially produced materials.

Redhouse says the materials produced will be "insulative, structural, and fire-resistant" and could act as insulation material and fire boards.

If protected from excess moisture the materials will last indefinitely, but at the end of the life-cycle they can be composted.

Redhouse says recycled materials could be used for "building dignified and insulated relief shelters directly on site after natural disasters and mitigating millions of tons of demolition waste that go to land fills each year".

Redhouse is collaborating with research scientists at NASA and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Learn more about the project here.

Images courtesy of Redhouse

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